Vainly he tosses on the ebb and flow, and in
his spirit diverse cares make conflicting call; when Messapus, who haply
bore in his left hand two tough spear-shafts topped with steel, runs
lightly up and aims and hurls one of them upon him with unerring stroke.
his spirit diverse cares make conflicting call; when Messapus, who haply
bore in his left hand two tough spear-shafts topped with steel, runs
lightly up and aims and hurls one of them upon him with unerring stroke.
Virgil - Aeneid
Now mine hand shall give thee defence in
war, and lead thee to great reward: do thou, when hereafter thine age
ripens to fulness, keep this in remembrance, and as thou recallest the
pattern of thy kindred, let thy spirit rise to thy father Aeneas, thine
uncle Hector. '
These words uttered, he issued towering from the gates, brandishing his
mighty spear: with him in serried column rush Antheus and Mnestheus, and
all the throng streams forth of the camp. The field drifts with blinding
dust, and the startled earth trembles under the tramp of feet. From his
earthworks opposite Turnus saw and the Ausonians saw them come, and an
icy shudder ran deep through their frame; first and before all the
Latins Juturna heard and knew the sound, and in terror fled away. He
flies on, and hurries his dark column over the open plain. As when in
fierce weather a storm-cloud moves over mid sea to land, with presaging
heart, ah me, the hapless husbandmen shudder from afar; it will deal
havoc to their trees and destruction to their crops, and make a broad
path of ruin; the winds fly before it, and bear its roar to the beach;
so the Rhoetean captain drives his army full on the foe; one and all
they close up in wedges, and mass their serried ranks. Thymbraeus smites
massive Osiris with the sword, Mnestheus slays Arcetius, Achates Epulo,
Gyas Ufens: Tolumnius the augur himself goes down, he who had hurled the
first weapon against the foe. Their cry rises to heaven, and in turn the
routed Rutulians give backward in flight over the dusty fields. Himself
he deigns not to cut down the fugitives, nor pursue such as meet him
fair on foot or approach in arms: Turnus alone he tracks and searches in
the thick haze, alone calls him to conflict. Then panic-stricken the
warrior maiden flings Turnus' charioteer out over his reins, and leaving
him far where he slips from the [471-504]chariot-pole, herself succeeds
and turns the wavy reins, tones and limbs and armour all of Metiscus'
wearing. As when a black swallow flits through some rich lord's spacious
house, and circles in flight the lofty halls, gathering her tiny food
for sustenance to her twittering nestlings, and now swoops down the
spacious colonnades, now round the wet ponds; in like wise dart
Juturna's horses amid the enemy, and her fleet chariot passes flying
over all the field. And now here and now here she displays her
triumphant brother, nor yet allows him to close, but flies far and away.
None the less does Aeneas thread the circling maze to meet him, and
tracks his man, and with loud cry cries on him through the scattered
ranks. Often as he cast eyes on his enemy and essayed to outrun the
speed of the flying-footed horses, so often Juturna wheeled her team
away. Alas, what can he do?
Vainly he tosses on the ebb and flow, and in
his spirit diverse cares make conflicting call; when Messapus, who haply
bore in his left hand two tough spear-shafts topped with steel, runs
lightly up and aims and hurls one of them upon him with unerring stroke.
Aeneas stood still, and gathered himself behind his armour, sinking on
bended knee; yet the rushing spear bore off his helmet-spike, and dashed
the helmet-plume from the crest. Then indeed his wrath swells; and
forced to it by their treachery, while chariot and horses disappear, he
calls Jove oft and again to witness, and the altars of the violated
treaty, and now at last plunges amid their lines. Sweeping terrible down
the tide of battle he wakens fierce indiscriminate carnage, and flings
loose all the reins of wrath.
What god may now unfold for me in verse so many woes, so many diverse
slaughters and death of captains whom now Turnus, now again the Trojan
hero, drives over all the field? Was it well, O God, that nations
destined to everlasting peace should clash in so vast a shock? Aeneas
[505-540]meets Sucro the Rutulian; the combat stayed the first rush of
the Teucrians, but delayed them not long; he catches him on the side,
and, when fate comes quickest, drives the harsh sword clean through the
ribs where they fence the breast. Turnus brings down Amycus from
horseback with his brother Diores, and meets them on foot; him he
strikes with his long spear as he comes, him with his sword-point, and
hangs both severed heads on his chariot and carries them off dripping
with blood. The one sends to death Talos and Tanais and brave Cethegus,
three at one meeting, and gloomy Onites, of Echionian name, and Peridia
the mother that bore him; the other those brethren sent from Lycia and
Apollo's fields, and Menoetes the Arcadian, him who loathed warfare in
vain; who once had his art and humble home about the river-fisheries of
Lerna, and knew not the courts of the great, but his father was tenant
of the land he tilled. And as fires kindled dispersedly in a dry forest
and rustling laurel-thickets, or foaming rivers where they leap swift
and loud from high hills, and speed to sea each in his own path of
havoc; as fiercely the two, Aeneas and Turnus, dash amid the battle;
now, now wrath surges within them, and unconquerable hearts are torn;
now in all their might they rush upon wounds. The one dashes Murranus
down and stretches him on the soil with a vast whirling mass of rock, as
he cries the names of his fathers and forefathers of old, a whole line
drawn through Latin kings; under traces and yoke the wheels spurned him,
and the fast-beating hoofs of his rushing horses trample down their
forgotten lord. The other meets Hyllus rushing on in gigantic pride, and
hurls his weapon at his gold-bound temples; the spear pierced through
the helmet and stood fast in the brain. Neither did thy right hand save
thee from Turnus, O Cretheus, bravest of the Greeks; nor did his gods
shield Cupencus when Aeneas came; he gave his [541-575]breast full to
the steel, nor, alas! was the brazen shield's delay aught of avail. Thee
likewise, Aeolus, the Laurentine plains saw sink backward and cover a
wide space of earth; thou fallest, whom Argive battalions could not lay
low, nor Achilles the destroyer of Priam's realm. Here was thy goal of
death; thine high house was under Ida, at Lyrnesus thine high house, on
Laurentine soil thy tomb.
war, and lead thee to great reward: do thou, when hereafter thine age
ripens to fulness, keep this in remembrance, and as thou recallest the
pattern of thy kindred, let thy spirit rise to thy father Aeneas, thine
uncle Hector. '
These words uttered, he issued towering from the gates, brandishing his
mighty spear: with him in serried column rush Antheus and Mnestheus, and
all the throng streams forth of the camp. The field drifts with blinding
dust, and the startled earth trembles under the tramp of feet. From his
earthworks opposite Turnus saw and the Ausonians saw them come, and an
icy shudder ran deep through their frame; first and before all the
Latins Juturna heard and knew the sound, and in terror fled away. He
flies on, and hurries his dark column over the open plain. As when in
fierce weather a storm-cloud moves over mid sea to land, with presaging
heart, ah me, the hapless husbandmen shudder from afar; it will deal
havoc to their trees and destruction to their crops, and make a broad
path of ruin; the winds fly before it, and bear its roar to the beach;
so the Rhoetean captain drives his army full on the foe; one and all
they close up in wedges, and mass their serried ranks. Thymbraeus smites
massive Osiris with the sword, Mnestheus slays Arcetius, Achates Epulo,
Gyas Ufens: Tolumnius the augur himself goes down, he who had hurled the
first weapon against the foe. Their cry rises to heaven, and in turn the
routed Rutulians give backward in flight over the dusty fields. Himself
he deigns not to cut down the fugitives, nor pursue such as meet him
fair on foot or approach in arms: Turnus alone he tracks and searches in
the thick haze, alone calls him to conflict. Then panic-stricken the
warrior maiden flings Turnus' charioteer out over his reins, and leaving
him far where he slips from the [471-504]chariot-pole, herself succeeds
and turns the wavy reins, tones and limbs and armour all of Metiscus'
wearing. As when a black swallow flits through some rich lord's spacious
house, and circles in flight the lofty halls, gathering her tiny food
for sustenance to her twittering nestlings, and now swoops down the
spacious colonnades, now round the wet ponds; in like wise dart
Juturna's horses amid the enemy, and her fleet chariot passes flying
over all the field. And now here and now here she displays her
triumphant brother, nor yet allows him to close, but flies far and away.
None the less does Aeneas thread the circling maze to meet him, and
tracks his man, and with loud cry cries on him through the scattered
ranks. Often as he cast eyes on his enemy and essayed to outrun the
speed of the flying-footed horses, so often Juturna wheeled her team
away. Alas, what can he do?
Vainly he tosses on the ebb and flow, and in
his spirit diverse cares make conflicting call; when Messapus, who haply
bore in his left hand two tough spear-shafts topped with steel, runs
lightly up and aims and hurls one of them upon him with unerring stroke.
Aeneas stood still, and gathered himself behind his armour, sinking on
bended knee; yet the rushing spear bore off his helmet-spike, and dashed
the helmet-plume from the crest. Then indeed his wrath swells; and
forced to it by their treachery, while chariot and horses disappear, he
calls Jove oft and again to witness, and the altars of the violated
treaty, and now at last plunges amid their lines. Sweeping terrible down
the tide of battle he wakens fierce indiscriminate carnage, and flings
loose all the reins of wrath.
What god may now unfold for me in verse so many woes, so many diverse
slaughters and death of captains whom now Turnus, now again the Trojan
hero, drives over all the field? Was it well, O God, that nations
destined to everlasting peace should clash in so vast a shock? Aeneas
[505-540]meets Sucro the Rutulian; the combat stayed the first rush of
the Teucrians, but delayed them not long; he catches him on the side,
and, when fate comes quickest, drives the harsh sword clean through the
ribs where they fence the breast. Turnus brings down Amycus from
horseback with his brother Diores, and meets them on foot; him he
strikes with his long spear as he comes, him with his sword-point, and
hangs both severed heads on his chariot and carries them off dripping
with blood. The one sends to death Talos and Tanais and brave Cethegus,
three at one meeting, and gloomy Onites, of Echionian name, and Peridia
the mother that bore him; the other those brethren sent from Lycia and
Apollo's fields, and Menoetes the Arcadian, him who loathed warfare in
vain; who once had his art and humble home about the river-fisheries of
Lerna, and knew not the courts of the great, but his father was tenant
of the land he tilled. And as fires kindled dispersedly in a dry forest
and rustling laurel-thickets, or foaming rivers where they leap swift
and loud from high hills, and speed to sea each in his own path of
havoc; as fiercely the two, Aeneas and Turnus, dash amid the battle;
now, now wrath surges within them, and unconquerable hearts are torn;
now in all their might they rush upon wounds. The one dashes Murranus
down and stretches him on the soil with a vast whirling mass of rock, as
he cries the names of his fathers and forefathers of old, a whole line
drawn through Latin kings; under traces and yoke the wheels spurned him,
and the fast-beating hoofs of his rushing horses trample down their
forgotten lord. The other meets Hyllus rushing on in gigantic pride, and
hurls his weapon at his gold-bound temples; the spear pierced through
the helmet and stood fast in the brain. Neither did thy right hand save
thee from Turnus, O Cretheus, bravest of the Greeks; nor did his gods
shield Cupencus when Aeneas came; he gave his [541-575]breast full to
the steel, nor, alas! was the brazen shield's delay aught of avail. Thee
likewise, Aeolus, the Laurentine plains saw sink backward and cover a
wide space of earth; thou fallest, whom Argive battalions could not lay
low, nor Achilles the destroyer of Priam's realm. Here was thy goal of
death; thine high house was under Ida, at Lyrnesus thine high house, on
Laurentine soil thy tomb.
